America’s spies save lives — and they’re good at it

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Imagine for a moment that you are President of the United States. Suicide bombers blow up one of your warships, then two of your embassies, then three of your country’s biggest office buildings. Your task is to prevent such atrocities happening again. Do you a) attack the country that harboured the suicide bombers; b) turn loose your most capable eavesdropping operation with orders to do whatever it takes to pre-empt future bombings; c) do both of the above; or d) restrict your armed forces and intelligence agencies to conventional counter-terrorism with a zero tolerance approach to violations of the Geneva